Never united, Sept. 11 family members divided over planned Islamic center near ground zero

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9/11 family members divided over mosque near WTC

NEW YORK — When her EMT son went missing in the days after 9/11, Talat Hamdani traveled to Mecca to pray that he was safe — hoping authorities could have thought him a suspect because of his Muslim background and detained him.

When they returned part of his body to her — his lower half shattered into 34 pieces — it was a final proof he had been killed at the World Trade Center.

Her son Salman’s killing was indiscriminate, but now, as Americans take sides over plans to build an Islamic cultural center blocks from ground zero, Hamdani says that Muslims are being targeted — and it feels personal.

“Why are we paying the price? Why are we being ostracized? Our loved ones died,” she said at her Lake Grove, N.Y., home. “America was founded on the grounds of religious freedom,” and opposition to the cultural center “is un-American. It’s unethical. And it is wrong.”

Again and again, political and religious leaders have said they’re speaking on behalf of the Sept. 11, 2001, victims’ families in the debate over the $100 million proposed community center and mosque two blocks north of the attack site.

But the thousands of relatives of the 2,976 victims have no single representative and no unified voice. Indeed, with emotions running high as another 9/11 anniversary approaches, the conflict is dividing a group that in many ways has never been united.

Some relatives say the cultural center would reopen old wounds too close to hallowed ground. Others say that opposing it is tantamount to bigotry.

And some, like Vandna Jain, walk a middle ground.

“It is unfair to persecute the group, however, in turn, there should be some respect for the feelings of the people that are forever attached to this site due to their losses,” the New City, N.Y., resident, whose father, Yudh, died in the north tower, wrote in an e-mail. “I think people have a right to be upset about it, just as much as people have a right to build a mosque.”

Jim Riches, a former FDNY deputy chief whose son, Jimmy, was killed at the trade center, believes the dispute has nothing to do with religious freedom.

“We’re not telling them not to practice their religion. … It’s about location, location, location,” he said, asking why the mosque couldn’t be built further away from the land that he still considers a cemetery. “It’s disrespectful. You wouldn’t put a Japanese cultural center at Pearl Harbor.”

Liza Murphy feels differently. Her brother, Charlie, died at ground zero, but she says she doesn’t lay claim to the sprawling, 16-acre site.

“It’s a place where a terrible tragedy took place, but I don’t see what makes it sacred,” said the Brooklyn resident. “Nine years later, that now belongs to the public. And my brother and his death are private and belong to me.”

Murphy says she has no objection to the planned mosque and wouldn’t want to judge one group of Muslims based on the actions of another.

But Peter Gadiel says he owes no apologies for singling one group out. Since his son, James, was killed at the trade center, Gadiel has argued publicly that all Muslims should share some collective guilt for what happened on 9/11.

“The fact is that Islam does not coexist well with other religions, and you can’t separate that from Islam,” the Kent, Conn., resident said, explaining his stand against the mosque. “If that sounds intolerant on my part, that’s too bad.”

The families’ impassioned responses to the prospect of the mosque have influenced the public debate.

Gov. David Paterson has suggested moving the project further away from the trade center site out of respect for opponents’ feelings, while Mayor Michael Bloomberg came out in support of the mosque, calling it a test of the separation of church and state.

President Barack Obama has said he believes Muslims have the right to build the Islamic center as a matter of religious freedom, though he’s also said he won’t take a position on whether they should actually build it.

Relatives of those slain on Sept. 11 have made their diverging voices heard on a number of issues over the years — from whether to try the Sept. 11 suspects in a civilian court to the location of a proposed freedom museum at ground zero that is no longer planned for the site.

Charles Wolf, who lost his wife, Katherine, at the trade center, says emotions among family members are especially raw right now.

“This is anniversary season. It’s really, really hard,” the Manhattanite said. “Passions are up and this is bringing up a lot of hurt in people.”

He says he worries that any decision to respond to public pressure and move the mosque would be used by extremists to paint Americans as intolerant.

“The powers of evil were piloting those airplanes,” he said of the Sept. 11 attackers.

Now, with the mosque dispute, “here is where we’re falling into the terrorists’ trap … trying to tear each other apart. Good people fighting other good people — does that sound like evil at work?”

Associated Press writers David B. Caruso and Karen Matthews in New York and Martha Raffaele in Philadelphia contributed to this report.